Chapter Fifteen.
The Affair of the ‘Francesca’ and the ‘Barracouta’s’ Boats.
I continued to industriously scrutinise the brig through the night-glass, and, by so doing, contrived to keep Mendouca’s attention also pretty closely centred upon her; but I could see that he was fully on the alert. He appeared to instinctively scent danger in the air, for he frequently assumed an anxious, listening attitude, with a growing irritability that manifested itself in repeated execration of the slaves for the quite unavoidable splashing sounds that they made in working the sweeps. He was also intently watching the thin crescent of the setting moon that was by this time hanging on the very verge of the western horizon; and I suspected that he was awaiting her disappearance to put in practice some stratagem—such as, perhaps, a further alteration of the ship’s course—as an additional safeguard. But, whatever may have been his intentions, they were all altered by an unlucky discovery made by one of the men on the forecastle, who, at the very moment when the moon was in the act of sinking behind the horizon, caught sight for a moment of a large boat full of men strongly outlined against the golden crescent, and immediately reported the fact, coming aft that he might do so without raising his voice.
“A boat!” exclaimed Mendouca anxiously, when the man had told what he had seen. “Are you quite sure?”
“As sure as I am that I am now standing here speaking to you, señor,” answered the man, in a tone of conviction. “José saw it also. We were both watching the disappearing moon, and when she was about half-way below the horizon we suddenly saw a large boat, pulling, I should say, at least twelve oars, glide swiftly across her face, as though steering to the southward on a line that would cross our course.”
“Phew!” ejaculated Mendouca; “that looks serious. For it undoubtedly means that the brig’s people are by no means as fast asleep as you have imagined them to be, Dugdale. How far off did you judge the boat to be when you saw her?” he demanded, turning again to the seaman.
“A matter of a mile and a half, or perhaps a trifle more,” was the answer.
“Very well, then, that will do,” answered Mendouca. “‘Forewarned is forearmed,’ as the English say. As you go forward pass the word along for the sweeps to be laid in and stowed away, and for the negroes to be sent below, and the hatch gratings put on and secured. And, do you hear, everything must be done as noiselessly as possible.”
“Bueno, señor,” answered the man, as he turned away to do Mendouca’s bidding; and in a few minutes the sweeps were laid in and stowed away, and the brigantine’s head gently turned more to the southward, in order that she might drift in that direction as long as she retained her way. Then, the slaves having been driven below and secured, the decks were rapidly but noiselessly cleared for action, the guns were cast loose and loaded, a liberal supply of grape and canister was passed on deck, arms were served out to the men, and the boarding nettings were triced up all round the ship. The whole of the work was executed so rapidly and silently as to clearly demonstrate that the crew was a thoroughly seasoned one, inured to fighting, and by no means averse to it when the chances were in their favour, as they certainly were in the present instance; and I was filled with chagrin and disgust at the thought of how simple an accident had sufficed to mar and defeat what might otherwise have proved a perfect surprise to Mendouca and his crew. Still, although I could not conceal from myself the fact that this apparently trivial accident had placed the attacking party at a woeful disadvantage, by warning their antagonists of the intended attack, and thus putting them on the alert, I had seen enough of British pluck to hope that even yet, despite all, it might still prove successful; and I awaited the event with no small anxiety, quite determined that if the slightest chance offered of affording any aid to the assailants, I would avail myself of it, let the consequences to myself be what they would. But Mendouca soon proved that he was not the man to overlook any such peril as this; for presently, when by personal inspection he had satisfied himself that everything was in readiness, he came up to me and said, with just the suspicion of a sneer in the tones of his voice—
“Now, Dugdale, I will not pay you so poor a compliment as to suppose you capable of treacherously making use of your present position on board my ship, to raise your hand against the man who gave you your life, at the moment when his whole attention will be needed to protect himself against outside enemies. Still, your conscience appears to be a very curious and inscrutable thing, and there is no knowing what it may prompt you to do under the influence of excitement and misguided enthusiasm. In order therefore that you may be placed beyond the danger of temptation to do something that you would probably afterwards have cause to bitterly regret, I will ask you to go below to your cabin, where, for your own safety’s sake, I will take the liberty of locking you in, with a companion whose duty it will be to see that you remain there and do not commit yourself by any rash act.”
“Oh, certainly!” I answered, rather bitterly. “Needs must when the devil drives; so lead on, most courteous señor.”
“Look here, Dugdale,” said he, apparently rather hurt by my tone, “you must not feel yourself aggrieved at my action in this matter. What I propose to do is for your own good and safety, quite as much as by way of a safeguard of my own. My men are fairly amenable to discipline in their calmer moments, as you have doubtless discovered by this time; but I should be sorry to answer for them in the excitement of a fiercely-contested fight, such as this is likely to be; and since you have persistently refused to join us out and out, I honestly think it will be safer for you to be below out of sight until we have driven those meddlesome boats off.”
“Very well,” said I; “it must of course be as you please. Only, for mercy’s sake, spare me the humiliation of mounting a guard over me!”
He looked me intently in the eyes for a moment, and then said—
“All right, I will; you shall be locked up by yourself. Only, for your own sake, be careful to behave exactly as you would in the presence of a guard; for I promise you that, if I have the slightest reason to suspect any treachery on your part, you will be sorry that I ever spared your life. Now, come along, for there is no time to spare.”
I accordingly followed him below and entered my cabin, closing the door behind me, and I immediately heard him turn the key and withdraw it from the lock, after which he went on deck again; and for a time the most perfect stillness and silence reigned throughout the ship.
The silence was not of long duration, however; for I had scarcely been in my cabin ten minutes when I heard a low murmur of voices overhead, and the next instant Mendouca’s voice pealed outs loud and clear, in English—
“Ho, the boats ahoy! Who are you, and what do you want?”
There was some reply that I could not catch, the voice evidently coming from a point at some distance from the ship, on the opposite side to that occupied by my cabin. It was probably an inquiry as to name and destination of the brigantine, for Mendouca shouted—
“The Nubian Queen, of and for Liverpool, from the Brass river, with oil and ivory. Keep off, or I will fire into you! I warn you that we are armed, and are quite prepared to defend ourselves.”
A long hail from the boats now followed, to which Mendouca replied—
“If you do it will be at your peril; I have been cleared out once before just about this same spot, and I do not intend to be robbed a second time. Keep off, I tell you! If you advance another stroke I will fire!”
And instantly afterwards I heard him say to his own men in Spanish—
“Now, lads, you have them all in a cluster, let them have it. Fire!”
The sharp, ringing report of the brigantine’s nine-pounders immediately pealed out, and even through the shock and concussion of the discharge I thought that, as I stood with my ear at the open port, I caught the sound of a crash. Whether this was so or not, there could be no mistake about the screams and groans of agony that came floating over the water in response to our broadside, mingled with cries of command, the roll and dash of oars in the water, a rattling volley of musketry, and the deeper notes of two boat-guns fired almost together, the shot of one at least of which I heard and felt strike the hull of the brigantine.
All was now in an instant noise and confusion on deck; the silence that had held the tongues of the crew was now no longer necessary, and the jabber, the oaths, the shouting, the loud, defiant laughs, the rumbling of the gun-carriages, the creaking of tackle-blocks, the thud of rammers and sponges, the calls for cartridges, all combined to create a hubbub that would not have shamed the builders of Babel; and through all and above all rose Mendouca’s voice in short, sharp sentences of appeal, encouragement, and direction to his men. I could hear, by the furious grinding of handspikes, the breathless ejaculations of the men, and the crash of the gun-carriages as the guns were run out, that the Francesca’s crew were working like demons; and almost before I could have believed it possible, they had again loaded their guns and a second broadside rang out over the still water, to be again followed by a still more gruesome chorus of cries and groans, and the sudden cessation of the sound of the oars, loud above which rose the exultant cheers of the ruffians on deck.
“Hurrah, lads!” I heard Mendouca exclaim joyously; “load again smartly, but with grape and canister only this time. We have checked them for a moment, but they have not yet had enough, I fear; they will come at us again as soon as they have picked up their shipmates, so now is your time; load and let them have it while they are stationary!”
And while he was speaking I could also hear a voice—that, unless I was greatly mistaken, belonged to Young, the first luff of the Barracouta—exclaiming at no great distance—
“Pull starboard, back port; now back, hard, all, and let us pick up those poor fellows before the sharks get the scent of them! Easy all; steady, lads, steady; hold water! Now then, my hearties, lay hold of the oars and let us get you inboard sharp; we can’t afford to lie here to be peppered. Help the wounded, those of you who are unhurt. That’s your sort, Styles, bring him along here; is he still alive, do you think? All right, I have him! Now then, coxswain, heave with a will, but don’t hurt the poor fellow more than you can help. Gently, man, gently; now lift handsomely, so—”
Crash! the relentless broadside of the Francesca again pealed forth, and again uprose that dismal wail of shrieks in testimony of its too terribly truthful aim. Frantic cheers and shouts of exultation burst from the lips of the slaver’s crew, in the midst of which Mendouca’s voice rang out—
“Now, stand by, men! here they come; but there is only one boat-load of them, and half their number must be killed or wounded. Stand by with your pikes, pistols, and cutlasses, and let not one of them show his head above the rail. Give them a volley from your pistols as they range alongside, and then trust to cold steel for the rest. Now is your time! Fire!”
And at the word there followed a tremendous popping of pistols, mingled with the yells of the men on deck, a British cheer that sent the blood tingling through my veins and made me anathematise my helpless condition, the sharp, ringing clash of steel upon steel, and a furious trampling of bare feet upon the planks overhead.
The scuffle continued for fully three minutes, and must have been very hot while it lasted, for all through the hubbub the cries and groans of the freshly-wounded were continuous. I could hear the dull crunching sound of the sharp cutlasses shearing through bone and muscle, the shrill scream of agony, the heavy thud of bodies falling to the deck, oaths and execrations both in Spanish and in English, shouts of mutual encouragement, yells of deadly hatred, the ceaseless trampling of feet, and all the indescribable medley of sounds that accompany a sharp and stubbornly-contested hand-to-hand conflict; and in my feverish anxiety to share in the struggle I forgot all about Mendouca’s warning, and dashed myself frantically against the stout cabin-door in an effort to burst my way out. Before, however, I could succeed the hurly-burly suddenly ceased, to be almost instantly followed by a yell of exultation from the crowd overhead as the hasty rattle and splash of oars proclaimed that the attacking party had been driven off.
“Now, men, to your guns again, quick! Load smartly and give them another broadside before they get out of range!” shouted Mendouca. “Sweep them off the face of the water, if you can; let not one of them escape to tell the tale!”
A loud shout of exulting assent to this brutal exhortation pealed forth; and I heard the rumbling of the wheels on the deck as the guns were run in. This was more than I could endure; and again hurling myself furiously against the cabin-door, I at length succeeded in bursting it off its hinges. To emerge from the cabin and rush on deck was the work of a moment, and I reached the scene of action just as the loaded guns were being run out.
“Stop!” I shouted. “What are you about to do, men? You have utterly mistaken your captain’s orders if you suppose he meant you to fire upon that boat! Order them to secure the guns,” I continued, turning to Mendouca; “it surely cannot be that you are going to allow the excitement of battle to betray you into the committal of a cold-blooded murder? You have beaten off your enemies, and they are in full retreat; let that satisfy you. Hitherto you have been fighting, and, as you are aware, the present state of the law is such that you are held justifiable in your act of self-defence; but should you fire upon that boat now it will be murder, and I swear to you that if you do I will testify against you for the deed, if I live so long. Man, have you no regard for yourself? Do you suppose that the captain of yonder brig will be content to take the beating off of his boats as a final settlement of this night’s doings? I tell you he will follow you and hunt you to the world’s end, ay, and take you, sooner or later! And what do you suppose will be your fate if you murder that retreating boat’s crew? Why, you will swing for the deed, as certainly as that you now stand there glaring at me!”
“Have you finished?” he demanded, in a voice almost inarticulate with fury, his hand resting meanwhile upon the butt of a pistol that was stuck in his sash.
“Yes,” said I, “I have. That is to say, I have finished if I have succeeded in preventing the perpetration of an act of miserable cowardice that in your cooler moments would cause you to hate and despise yourself for the remainder of your life; not otherwise.”
Slowly he removed his hand from the butt of his pistol and, with a bitter laugh, drew a cigar from his pocket and lighted it.
“Secure the guns!” he shouted to his men. Then walking up to me and clutching me by the shoulder, he said—
“You have triumphed again. But I warn you that some day you will go too far, and pay for your temerity with your life. Do you know that while you were speaking you were actually tottering upon the very brink of the grave? Why I did not blow your brains out, I do not know. Boy, if you have any wish to live out your days, never taunt me with cowardice again! There, go below, and do not let me see you again until I have recovered my self-command, or even yet I shall do you a mischief.”
“No,” I said, “I will not go below; it is my watch on deck, and I mean to keep it. I have no fear of your temper getting the better of you now, so I shall remain where I am—that is, if you will trust me with the charge of the deck. I am fresh, while you are fagged with exertion and excitement, so it is for you to go below and get some rest, not I.”
Mendouca laughed again, this time quite genially, and said—
“Very well, let it be as you say; I will go below and rest. And if it is any comfort to you to know it, I do not mind acknowledging now that I am glad you intervened to prevent me from firing on that boat. Keep her as she is going and let the niggers man the sweeps again; you are right about that brig, she will follow us to the world’s end—if she can, so we must put all the distance possible between ourselves and her while this calm lasts.”
And, repeating to the boatswain his orders respecting the manning of the sweeps, this singular man nodded shortly to me and dived out of sight down the companion-way.
In a few minutes a gang of slaves was again brought on deck and put to the sweeps; and steering a course of about south-south-west, we were soon once more moving through the water at a speed of about three knots. This course was followed all through the night and up to eight o’clock the next morning, at which hour—one of the men having been sent aloft as far as the royal-yard to see whether any sign of the brig could be discovered, and having returned to the deck again with an intimation that the horizon was clear all round—the brigantine’s position was pricked off upon the chart and her head once more pointed straight for Cuba.
We had by this time traversed a distance of fully sixty miles under the impulsion of the sweeps alone, and everybody was anxiously watching for some sign of a coming breeze; yet, despite the already long continuance of the calm, the heavens were still as brass to us, clear, cloudless, blue as the fathomless depths beneath our feet, not the merest vestige of cloud to be seen, the mercury still persistently steady at an abnormal height, the sea as smooth and motionless as a sheet of glass, and not the smallest sign to justify us in hoping for any change. The heat was something absolutely phenomenal; the deck planking was so hot that we all had to wear shoes to protect our feet from being scorched; a gang of negroes was kept constantly at work drawing water with which to flood the deck; yet, despite this precaution, and despite, too, the awnings which were now spread fore and aft, the pitch in the seams of the planking became so soft that if I stood still for only a few seconds I found myself stuck fast. I pitied the unfortunate blacks from the bottom of my heart, for they were relentlessly kept toiling at those horrible sweeps without intermission all through the day, and that, too, upon a short allowance of water; but it was useless to interfere, for even I had begun to understand by this time that, unless the brigantine could be taken out of that awful region of apparently eternal calm, every one of us, black and white together, must inevitably perish miserably of thirst.
This terrible weather lasted all through that and the following day, during which, with torment indescribable from thirst and the lash of the boatswains’ colts, the miserable slaves propelled the ship no less a distance than one hundred and fifty miles. Oh, how fervently I begged and entreated Mendouca to have mercy upon the unhappy creatures, and to at least give orders that they must be no more flogged, even if inexorable necessity demanded that they must be kept toiling at the sweeps. But the wretch was as adamant, he laughed and jeered at my sympathy with the poor creatures, and—as much, I believe, to annoy me as for any other reason—persistently refused to give the order, declaring that, since they would receive many a sound flogging when they got ashore—if indeed they ever lived to reach it—it was just as well that they should learn to endure the lash at once. At which brutal statement I went temporarily mad, I think—at all events I did what looked like a thoroughly mad thing; I went on deck and, walking up to the boatswain, informed him that if he or his mate dared to strike a negro again I would knock them both down. Mendouca, highly amused at my heat and excitement on behalf of the negroes, had followed me on deck, probably to see what I would next do; and upon hearing this threat he called out, jeeringly—
“Look out, José, my man! Señor Dugdale has warned you, and you may be sure that if you strike one of those niggers again he will carry out his threat!”
The boatswain saw at once how the land lay, and that Mendouca was only amusing himself at my expense; feeling confident therefore of his captain’s countenance and protection, I suppose, he, for answer, raised his colt and smote the nearest negro a savage blow over the shoulders with it.
Of course, after my possibly foolhardy threat there was but one thing to do, and I did it forthwith, hitting out with my whole strength, catching the boatswain fair between the eyes, and rolling him over like a ninepin.
“Ha, ha! well hit!” exclaimed Mendouca, laughing heartily at the sight of the boatswain as he reeled and fell under the feet of the negroes. “I warned you, José, my lad; and now you see the evil results of neglecting my warning! No, no,” he hastily continued, starting to his feet; “put up your knife, man; that will never do! I cannot afford to spare Señor Dugdale—at least not just yet—ah! would you? Look out, Dugdale! bravo! well hit again! Serves you right, José; you should never draw your knife upon an unarmed man.”
For the fellow had hastily scrambled to his feet, and, with his drawn knife in his hand, made a rush at me, his eyes blazing with fury. And, as the only way of defending myself at the moment, I had seized his uplifted right hand with my left, giving it a wrench that sent the knife spinning over the bulwarks into the sea, while with my right I again knocked him down.
“Now, José,” exclaimed Mendouca, “that ends the matter; do you hear? I cannot spare Señor Dugdale, so if he is found with a knife between his ribs I shall hold you responsible for it, and I give you my solemn promise that I will run you up to the yard-arm and leave you there until it will not matter to you what becomes of your miserable carcase. And I hope that the thrashing you have received will make you use a little more discrimination in the use of your colt. If a nigger won’t work, make him, by all means; but so long as they are willing to work without thrashing, leave them alone, I say. As for you, Dugdale,” he continued, in English, “had I suspected that you really meant to carry out your threat, I would have taken steps to prevent it. I will not have my men interfered with in the execution of their duty. If they do not perform their duty to my satisfaction, I will take such steps as may seem necessary for their correction, so you need not trouble yourself further in that direction. Why, man, if I were to give you a free hand, we should have a mutiny in less than a week. Moreover, you have made one deadly enemy by knocking José down, and you may consider yourself exceedingly fortunate if my authority proves sufficient to protect you from his knife. Take care you make no other enemies among the men, or I will not be answerable for your safety.”
This occurred shortly before sunset, and all through the hot and breathless night the unhappy negroes were kept toiling at the sweeps in gangs or relays, the result being that when morning dawned the poor wretches seemed, one and all, to be utterly worn-out. Yet still there was no respite for them; and when I again attempted to remonstrate with Mendouca, that individual simply pointed to the serene, cloudless sky, with the blazing, merciless sun in the midst, and savagely asked whether I wanted all hands to perish of hunger and thirst. This occurred while we were at breakfast; and when we went on deck at the conclusion of the meal, my enemy the boatswain drew Mendouca’s attention to the upper spars and sails of a ship just rising slowly above the horizon on our starboard bow. I never saw so sudden a change in a man’s demeanour as took place in that of Mendouca when his eye rested upon that distant object; hitherto he had been growing every day more savage and morose, but now his good-humour suddenly returned to him, and, ordering the brigantine’s head to be pointed straight for the stranger, he shouted, in the gladness of his heart—
“Hurrah, lads, there is relief for us at last! We shall find what we want—food and water—on board yon stranger, and also a way of persuading them to let us have it, or I am greatly mistaken!”
The significance of the last part of this remark was, to my mind, unmistakable. If he could not get by fair means what he wanted, Mendouca had already made up his mind to take it by force; in other words, to commit an act of piracy.
I was sorry for the crew of the unlucky craft, for I felt convinced that Mendouca would have but scant consideration for their future wants while satisfying his own; yet the sight of the stranger filled me with almost delirious delight, for here was a chance—if I could but contrive to avail myself of it—to make my escape from my present surroundings. True, if I were permitted, or could contrive, to throw in my lot with those people yonder, I should probably have to face terrible suffering in the shape of hunger and thirst, but, after all, that would be less unendurable than my present situation; and I determined that, whatever might happen, I would certainly make an attempt to join them, always provided, of course, that the craft was honest, and not of a similar character to the Francesca.
As we neared the stranger she proved to be a handsome, full-rigged ship of about a thousand tons measurement, or thereabouts, and I thought that she had somewhat of the look of one of the new British clipper Indiamen that were just at this time beginning to supersede the old-fashioned, slow, lumbering tubs that had been considered the correct kind of thing by John Company; if she were, she would probably have a crew strong enough not only to successfully resist the demands of Mendouca, but also to protect me, should I be able by any pretext to get on board her. The difficulty, of course, would be to do this; but if, as I rather expected, Mendouca should elect to lay the Francesca, alongside the ship and endeavour to carry the latter by a coup de main, I would board with the rest, taking my chance of being run through or shot down in the attempt, and immediately place myself under the protection of the stranger’s crew. It was of course easy enough to arrange this scheme in my own mind, but even a very slight deviation on Mendouca’s part from the programme which I expected him to adopt might suffice to nullify it; nevertheless, it appeared probable that my surmise as to Mendouca’s intentions would prove correct, for if he did not mean to lay the stranger aboard and carry her with a rush, I could scarcely understand the boldness with which he was approaching her in broad daylight, with his strongly-manned sweeps proclaiming to the most unsuspicious eye the dubious character of the brigantine.